Waiting for the Glitter to Settle

It has been several weeks since I wrote. I mean anything.

Not Captain Sasha. Not Detective Drew. Not even personal journaling. I could give a zillion reasons, but the truth is…my glitter hadn’t settled.

Years ago, while working at a teen center, I carried with me a tube of glitter water. Whenever one of my rascals would try to run away, or scream, or burst out crying we would find a place to sit. It was not uncommon to find myself sitting on a curb, or a cement wall with an upset rascal and my glitter tube.

We would just sit until the glitter settled before addressing the issue at hand.

It turns out, I haven’t been able to write, or think like a rational person, because I’ve been racing around in the glitter.

I recently came across some photos of my ex-husband, my sons and myself decades ago. When we were so innocent. When I thought we were real.

Before our family broke.

I was broadsided at the depth of hurt that ran through me as I looked through these photos. Deep heart wounds that I thought were mostly healed, suddenly felt raw.

I instantly called my sister and asked her to take the photos. She willingly obliged. Grateful for my sister.

Still…I was like God, help me here.

I was also in a mental spiral about our finances. I started looking at long term hotel stays (no we are not doing that) and panicking about my lack of insurance. Lupus is friggin’ expensive. Just sayin’.

Hot Stuff and I attended two funerals for unexpected deaths.

Flat tire, dead battery, broken oven….yada, yada, yada…

The deportations and detainments of a handful of those around me, the seeming loss of empathy for anyone less fortunate than the financially independent. The insanity of our politics.

I just wanted off the crazy train. I was losing hope.

I felt shame that my sons have a broken family. I felt shame for not having enough trust in God…

Mathew 17:20 “I’m telling you the truth: if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move.“, runs through my head.

I don’t want trust. I want reasonable hope.

I get irritated. Actually I get angry. Not just for my circumstances, but for the real hurts affecting my family and friends as well.

I am driving home from work one afternoon and decide to finally be honest with myself and God.

Stuffing my shame and anger in the hopes of growing trust just grew my shame in my inability to trust. It was a downward spiral.

I gave God my litany of grievances’…and let him know that I intended to just sit with my shame and anger for the next 24-48 hours.

I am quite confident that God can handle my anger.”And besides” I tell God, “if David could complain and then give praise and worship throughout the Psalms…I can to.”

Fiesty is the word Hot Stuff uses when I get like this.

My second day into my personal, and lovely, pity party. My friend Bev calls.

I crawl under the quilt on my bed and share with her my grievances. You know, the same ones I had just shared with God. “And the worst part?”, I vent, “I can’t even write. Nothing. I have nothing..” (you can see how rational my priorities are at this time)

And as we are talking I remember the glitter jar.

Bev has been listening to pod casts by Rick Warren. In particular The Invisible War series.

The two of us discuss the different types of turmoil that affect all of us. The inner turmoil, the circumstantial/or worldly turmoil, and the turmoil of the outer world.

As Bev and I talk, I understand that I have not only been trying to be rational in the glitter, but that I’ve had three glitter jars mixed together!

Then I see something that says “your kids may have a broken home, but they don’t have a broken mom.”

I sit with that for a minute. Yes, I’ve had my couple weeks of panic, but I have not abandoned myself to keep peace. I have not turned into a shell of my being. I am not emotionally numb.

I have dared to create a kind and gentle lifestyle for myself. I have dared to love again. I am a mom that dared to break a cycle and start a new life.

I forgive myself.

And then it happens. That peace that surpasses all understanding

Phillipians 4:7 ⁷ And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

God gently reminds me that all I have to do, is love the people in front of me. Today.

Enjoy my life. Today.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

The glitter has finally settled.